Breathe In, Breathe Out
by JT4Life
Summary: Post "Safe" SPOILERS. Peter tries to help Olivia deal with what she's been through and what she's still undergoing emotionally. Peter/Olivia fic, enjoy.


_For all of you out there who, like myself, are having a legitimate case of Fringe withdrawal, I hope this helps. I wanted to write something about what the repercussions of being kidnapped would do to Olivia on a mental level... and of course, Peter's reactions to it all. The title is from another song that I love.... aren't all my fics like that? lol!_

_Spoilers for Safe (and maybe Bound???). I don't own Fringe... *sigh* if only....._

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**Breathe In, Breathe Out**

"Breathe."

"I- I… can't…"

"Yes, you can. Take a breath on three, ok? One… two… three.... Now breathe in…. There you go."

"It hurts…"

"I know it does, I know."

Olivia's body was trembling in Peter's arms. There was a nasty cut on her forehead and the blood from it had stained her white blouse. She put a shaky hand to her head and closed her eyes. Her breath came in short gasps and Peter both saw and felt her cringe every time her lungs expanded. Having the wind knocked out of you wasn't pleasant, and she'd had a pretty bad fall.

"What…?" Olivia whispered. The effort of forming that one small word made her cough. She gasped and clutched her side in pain, closing her eyes and biting her lip to stop from crying out.

"You fell down _those_," Peter said softly, nodding in the direction of the cement stairs that led into the deepest part of the Harvard lab.

Olivia turned her head slightly to glance at the steps and let out a small groan.

"Hey," Peter said softly, gently brushing her jaw line with his fingertips. She looked back at him, her usually guarded expression momentarily gone, replaced with a vulnerability that Peter had only seen her display once before, just under a week ago when he'd first caught her eye in the hospital. It caught him off guard, seeing her like that, but he recovered himself quickly. "Do you think you can sit up so I can clean up that cut?"

She nodded blankly, the emotional wall back in business. Peter sighed as he laid her down and went about the lab finding bandages. He found a first aid kit in a matter of seconds and brought it back to Olivia. After quickly digging through the kit, he found some gauze and tape. Peter would have preferred to find something a little better, but he would have to work with what he had. Supporting Olivia with only one arm, Peter carefully propped her up against him. Olivia's head lolled back against his chest like a rag doll. It disturbed him that she didn't put up any kind of resistance to being cared for whatsoever. Peter had half-expected her to politely refuse treatment, insisting that she was fine, but no. She'd been like that ever since they'd gotten her back from _them_. The Olivia Dunham who came back from that horrid place where they'd found her wasn't the same Olivia he'd – _they'd_ lost. This Olivia Dunham never smiled, not even when Peter cracked one of his wise guy jokes just to see that stunning smile of hers, or to head her laughter that as beautiful as water running over stones in a small brook. She never sat still; something always had to be done somewhere, and Olivia had been hoping from errand to errand from the moment she'd been released from the hospital three days after being rescued. That was five days ago, and Peter worried about her, especially since this was the third time she'd fallen since being saved from her captures, but this was the first time she'd really hurt herself.

Peter frowned as he unwrapped the gauze single-handedly, his thoughts weighing heavily on his mind.

"What is it, Peter?" she asked him quietly.

"What do you mean?" Peter questioned, putting the gauze down, not knowing how she could have possibly sensed his change in emotion.

"What's wrong?" Olivia asked again, her voice very quiet and hardly above a whisper.

Peter resumed his job of unrolling the gauze. "I'm worried about you, 'Livia, you know that. I told you so the first time I saw you in the hospital, and my philosophy hasn't changed since."

Olivia fell quiet again while Peter took a damp cloth and cleaned the blood off her forehead. Even though the cut was deeper than he'd first thought it was, Peter didn't feel her flinch once while he dabbed at her wound. When Peter removed the cloth from her head, it was soaked with her blood. He frowned again, pushing vivid images of Olivia all bruised and beaten out of his mind. He told himself that he wouldn't think about what those people – what those inhumane psychopathic assholes had done to her, because it would only make him angrier. Angrier at himself for not coming to her rescue sooner, angry at the FBI for letting all of this happen, angry at his father for helping develop the technology that had tortured her, angry at pretty much everyone, save Olivia.

"You're doing it again," she said softly.

Peter didn't have to ask her what she meant. "I know, I can't help it," He paused briefly to clear his head. "How do you know that?"

"You start thinking so hard that your body stiffens and your breathing gets heavier," she said simply.

Peter nodded, impressed that she could read his body language so well. "Lay still," he instructed her, tipping her head up slightly with one hand and pressing the thick square of gauze against her head wound with the other. Olivia's back suddenly stiffened and Peter knew he'd hurt her.

"I'm sorry…" he said quietly, feeling sick for causing her even the slightest bit of discomfort after she'd been through hell and God knows what else.

"It's ok, Peter…. Thanks for doing all this," she replied and he felt her muscles relaxing again as she slouched against him with a small, barely audible, sigh of relief.

Peter finished taping down the patch in silence. Once finished, he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her arm across her shoulders, taking her hand in his. "I'm gonna get you over to the couch, ok?"

Olivia nodded slowly, her eyes beginning to show that helplessness look that made him just want to pull her close and hold her until the pain went away.

"Easy now…" Peter said softly as he stood as slowly as possible, allowing Olivia to place all her weight on him as her legs began to buckle. She grabbed a fistful of his shirt with her free hand in alarm. "I've got you, Olivia, I won't let you go," Peter coaxed her, gazing earnestly into her eyes.

Olivia nodded solemnly, the once-solid wall that blocked her feelings from him beginning to show cracks. For a split second, Peter thought that she would break down in his arms and let out some of the pain and anguish that was bottled up inside her like a dam about to collapse under the pressure of the water it held back. However, Olivia quickly turned her gaze to the floor, her cheeks turning red. Peter continued to ease her across the room, her feet stumbling and dragging occasionally, but Peter kept a firm grasp and held her closer to him.

"Don't lay down too fast, just take it slow," Peter advised her once they had reached the couch. Olivia nodded again and remained by his side. Peter was puzzled for a moment, fully expecting her to take charge of the situation. He wasn't used to this passive, dependent version of his Olivia. Sighing for the umpteenth time that day, Peter effortlessness lowered Olivia down onto the sofa. "Here," he said, grabbing a pillow and tucking it behind her head as carefully as he could. A headache was the last thing Olivia needed, if she didn't already have one.

"You know," Olivia began slowly, starring fixedly up at the ceiling, "this is one of the longest times I've stayed in the same place since they let me out of the hospital."

"I've noticed," Peter said, sitting down on the edge of the couch. When she didn't say anything, Peter got curious. "So, how much sleep have you been getting if you can't sit still for more than an hour?" He wanted to hear her to say that she had been sleeping, and that she just couldn't sit still during the day, but Olivia's expression said otherwise, and Peter suddenly wished he'd never asked her that question.

"I… I haven't been sleeping much," she whispered, still looking anywhere but at him, first playing with a loose string on her sleeve, and then focusing on the ceiling again.

Peter rubbed his forehead with his hand. "How much is 'not much'?" He dreaded the answer, but he needed to know.

Finally, Olivia stopped avoiding his gaze and looked him in the eyes. "Not more than four or five hours each night, and I keep waking up every hour or so…" she gulped and looked away again. Peter was stunned. How she had kept herself together this long was a mystery to him… but then again, much about her was a mystery to him.

"Olivia –" Peter began, but she cut him off.

"Please don't Peter," she begged him, pulling herself up into a sitting position, "I don't need you worrying about me more than you already do."

Peter laughed to hide the fact that he was blushing. "I have good reason to worry, 'Livvy."

Olivia opened her mouth as if she was about to speak, but something stopped her and she went back to playing with the loose string on her blouse sleeve.

"Olivia," Peter said, his expression a serious one. "Look at me." When she didn't, Peter placed his hand against her cheek and gently turned her head so she would face him. One glance into her eyes said that the dam behind them was under a lot of stress and could come crashing down at any second. And God knows that Peter wanted it to. She needed to let someone in, as well as letting some of her fears out. After going through something as traumatizing as being captured and tortured, she needed to open up, just a little bit, and the rush of emotion would take care of the rest.

Olivia's face grew hot under his hand and she was breathing heavily again.

"It's ok to talk to me," he whispered soothingly, placing his other hand on her other cheek. Peter could feel her body trembling beneath his hands as she tried to prevent the inevitable from happening. A small, single tear rolled down her cheek and Peter wiped it away. Olivia grabbed onto his arms like they were her lifelines as another tear rolled down her cheek and her upper lip quivered. "It's ok, 'Liv, it's ok to cry," Peter said softly.

That was the last straw. Olivia could only hang her head as sobs shook her entire body. Without hesitation, Peter pulled her in close and held her tightly as she cried, rubbing slow, soothing circles on her back. Olivia clung to him tightly, burying her face in his chest and soaking his shirt. Peter held her as she wept uncontrollably, hating to see her so miserable but he knew that she needed to do this. For the first time since she'd been back, Olivia was acting… well, less like an indifferent robot, and that thought brought Peter the most relief of all.

When both her tremors and tears had subsided, Olivia pulled away from him, her eyes still puffy, but less detached-from-the-rest-of-the-world looking. The tiniest hint of the Olivia Dunham that Peter knew and cared for was there, re-emerging from the depths.

"Thanks," she breathed, slightly out of breath. "I – I should go…"

She rose to leave but Peter stood up and caught her hand in his.

"Liv."

Olivia stopped and looked back at him, torn between wanting to leave and coming back to the reassuring comforts of being in his arms.

"I'll be here if you need anything, anything at all," Peter promised earnestly.

She nodded, her voice thick with emotion when she spoke. "I know, Peter. Thank you… for everything."

Olivia's hand slipped slowly, almost reluctantly, out of Peter's and he let his arm fall to his side. Peter watched her leave the lab with a sad smile. At least he'd gotten this far with her today… maybe tomorrow they would get a little further. Peter knew that she would get better; slowly, surely, Olivia would warm up to him and be able to talk about what had happened to her. The easy part was getting her out of captivity, physically. The real challenge would be bringing her back to safe ground psychologically. Peter knew all too well that it wouldn't be easy with her, but Olivia was well worth fighting for every day, any day – as long as he had breath in his lungs and a beating heart, Peter Bishop would go to whatever lengths necessary to save his girl.

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_So? What did you all think? Even if you didn't like it, I'm always open to constructive criticism. :)_

_Thanks for taking the time to read my stuff._


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